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The Penguin Putnam Inc. World Wide Web site address is http://www.penguinputnam.com
Check out the Ace Science Fiction & Fantasy newsletter and much more on the Internet at Club PPI!
ISBN: 0-441-00853-4
ACE® Ace Books are published by The Berkley Publishing Group,
a division of Penguin Putnam Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.
ACE and the "A" design are trademarks belonging to Penguin Putnam Inc.
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
10 987654321
My thanks and appreciation go to the people who thought this book
was a good idea—Dean James, Toni L. P. Kelner
and Gary and Susan Nowlin
Chapter 1

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i'd beenWAITING for the vampire for years when he walked into the bar.
Ever since vampires came out of the coffin (as they laugh-ingly put it) four years ago, I'd hoped one
would come to Bon Temps. We had all the other minorities in our little town—why not the newest, the
legally recognized undead? But rural northern Louisiana wasn't too tempting to vam-pires, apparently; on
the other hand, New Orleans was a real center for them—the whole Anne Rice thing, right?
It's not that long a drive from Bon Temps to New Orleans, and everyone who came into the bar said
that if you threw a rock on a street comer you'd hit one. Though you better not.
But I was waiting for my own vampire.
You can tell I don't get out much. And it's not because I'm not pretty. I am. I'm blond and blue-eyed and
twenty-five, and my legs are strong and my bosom is substantial, and I have a waspy waistline. I look
good in the warm-weather waitress outfit Sam picked for us: black shorts, white T, white socks, black
Nikes.
But I have a disability. That's how I try to think of it.
The bar patrons just say I'm crazy.
Either way, the result is that I almost never have a date. So little treats count a lot with me.
And he sat at one of my tables—the vampire.
I knew immediately what he was. It amazed me when no one else turned around to stare. They couldn't
tell! But to me, his skin had a little glow, and I just knew.
I could have danced with joy, and in fact I did do a little step right there by the bar. Sam Merlotte, my
boss, looked up from the drink he was mixing and gave me a tiny smile. I grabbed my tray and pad and
went over to the vampire's table. I hoped that my lipstick was still even and my ponytail was still neat. I'm
kind of tense, and I could feel my smile yanking the corners of my mouth up.
He seemed lost in thought, and I had a chance to give him a good once-over before he looked up. He
was a little under six feet, I estimated. He had thick brown hair, combed straight back and brushing his
collar, and his long sideburns seemed curiously old-fashioned. He was pale, of course; hey, he was dead,
if you believed the old tales. The politically correct theory, the one the vamps themselves publicly
backed, had it that this guy was the victim of a virus that left him apparently dead for a couple of days
and thereafter al-lergic to sunlight, silver, and garlic. The details depended on which newspaper you read.
They were all full of vampire stuff these days.
Anyway, his lips were lovely, sharply sculpted, and he had arched dark brows. His nose swooped down
right out of that arch, like a prince's in a Byzantine mosaic. When he finally looked up, I saw his eyes
were even darker than his hair, and the whites were incredibly white.
"What can I get you?" I asked, happy almost beyond words.
He raised his eyebrows. "Do you have the bottled synthetic blood?" he asked.
"No, I'm so sorry! Sam's got some on order. Should be in next week."

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"Then red wine, please," he said, and his voice was cool and clear, like a stream over smooth stones. I
laughed out loud. It was too perfect.
"Don't mind, Sookie, mister, she's crazy," came a familiarvoice from the booth against the wall. All my
happiness de-flated, though I could feel the smile still straining my lips. The vampire was staring at me,
watching the life go out of my face.
"I'll get your wine right away," I said, and strode off, not even looking at Mack Rattray's smug face. He
was there almost every night, he and his wife Denise. I called them the Rat Couple. They'd done their
best to make me miserable since they'd moved into the rent trailer at Four Tracks Cor-ner. I had hoped
that they'd blow out of Bon Temps as sud-denly as they'd blown in.
When they'd first come into Merlotte's, I'd very rudely listened in to their thoughts—I know, pretty
low-class of me. But I get bored like everyone else, and though I spend most of my time blocking out the
thoughts of other people that try to pass through my brain, sometimes I just give in. So I knew some
things about the Rattrays that maybe no one else did. For one thing, I knew they'd been in jail, though I
didn't know why. For another, I'd read the nasty thoughts Mack Rattray had entertained about yours
truly. And then I'd heard in Denise's thoughts that she'd abandoned a baby she'd had two years before, a
baby that wasn't Mack's.
And they didn't tip, either.
Sam poured a glass of the house red wine, looking over at the vampire's table as he put it on my tray.
When Sam looked back at me, I could tell he too knew our new customer was undead. Sam's eyes are
Paul Newman blue, as opposed to my own hazy blue gray. Sam is blond, too, but his hair is wiry and his
blond is almost a sort of hot red gold. He is always a little sunburned, and though he looks slight in his
clothes, I have seen him unload trucks with his shirt off, and he has plenty of upper body strength. I never
listen to Sam's thoughts. He's my boss. I've had to quit jobs before because I found out things I didn't
want to know about my boss.
But Sam didn't comment, he just gave me the wine. I checked the glass to make sure it was sparkly
clean and made my way back to the vampire's table.
"Your wine, sir," I said ceremoniously and placed it care-fully on the table exactly in front of him. He
looked at me again, and I stared into his lovely eyes while I had the chance. "Enjoy," I said proudly.
Behind me, Mack Rattray yelled, "Hey, Sookie! We need another pitcher of beer here!" I sighed and
turned to take the empty pitcher from the Rats' table. Denise was in fine form tonight, I noticed, wearing
a halter top and short shorts, her mess of brown hair floofing around her head in fashionable tangles.
Denise wasn't truly pretty, but she was so flashy and confident that it took awhile to figure that out.
A little while later, to my dismay, I saw the Rattrays had moved over to the vampire's table. They were
talking at him. I couldn't see that he was responding a lot, but he wasn't leaving either.
"Look at that!" I said disgustedly to Arlene, my fellow waitress. Arlene is redheaded and freckled and
ten years older than me, and she's been married four times. She has two kids, and from time to time, I
think she considers me her third.
"New guy, huh?" she said with small interest. Arlene is currently dating Rene Lenier, and though I can't
see the at-traction, she seems pretty satisfied. I think Rene was her sec-ond husband.

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"Oh, he's a vampire," I said, just having to share my delight with someone.
"Really? Here? Well, just think," she said, smiling a little to show she appreciated my pleasure. "He can't
be too bright, though, honey, if he's with the Rats. On the other hand, Denise is giving him quite a show."
I figured it out after Arlene made it plain to me; she's much better at sizing up sexual situations than I am
due to her experience and my lack.
The vampire was hungry. I'd always heard that the syn-thetic blood the Japanese had developed kept
vampires up to par as far as nutrition, but didn't really satisfy their hunger, which was why there were
"Unfortunate Incidents" from time to time. (That was the vampire euphemism for the bloody slaying of a
human.) And here was Denise Rattray, stroking her throat, turning her neck from side to side... what a
bitch.
My brother, Jason, came into the bar, then, and saunteredover to give me a hug. He knows that women
like a man who's good to his family and also kind to the disabled, so hugging me is a double whammy of
recommendation. Not that Jason needs many more points than he has just by being himself. He's
handsome. He can sure be mean, too, but most women seem quite willing to overlook that.
"Hey, sis, how's Gran?"
"She's okay, about the same. Come by to see."
"I will. Who's loose tonight?"
"Look for yourself." I noticed that when Jason began to glance around there was a flutter of female
hands to hair, blouses, lips.
"Hey. I see DeeAnne. She free?"
"She's here with a trucker from Hammond. He's in the bathroom. Watch it."
Jason grinned at me, and I marvelled that other women could not see the selfishness of that smile. Even
Arlene tucked in her T-shirt when Jason came in, and after four husbands she should have known a little
about evaluating men. The other waitress I worked with, Dawn, tossed her hair and straightened her
back to make her boobs stand out. Jason gave her an amiable wave. She pretended to sneer. She's on
the outs with Jason, but she still wants him to notice her.
I got really busy—everyone came to Merlotte's on Sat-urday night for some portion of the evening—so
I lost track of my vampire for a while. When I next had a moment to check on him, he was talking to
Denise. Mack was looking at him with an expression so avid that I became worried.
I went closer to the table, staring at Mack. Finally, I let down my guard and listened.
Mack and Denise had been in jail for vampire draining.
Deeply upset, I nevertheless automatically carried a pitcher of beer and some glasses to a raucous table
of four. Since vampire blood was supposed to temporarily relieve symp-toms of illness and increase
sexual potency, kind of like pred-nisone and Viagra rolled into one, there was a huge black market for
genuine, undiluted vampire blood. Where there's a market there are suppliers; in this case, I'd just
learned, the scummy Rat Couple. They'd formerly trapped vampires anddrained them, selling the little

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vials of blood for as much as $200 apiece. It had been the drug of choice for at least two years now.
Some buyers went crazy after drinking pure vam-pire blood, but that didn't slow the market any.
The drained vampire didn't last long, as a rule. The drain-ers left the vampires staked or simply dumped
them out in the open. When the sun came up, that was all she wrote. From time to time, you read about
the tables being turned when the vampire managed to get free. Then you got your dead drainers.
Now my vampire was getting up and leaving with the Rats. Mack met my eyes, and I saw him looking
distinctly startled at the expression on my face. He turned away, shrugging me off like everyone else.
That made me mad. Really mad.
What should I do? While I struggled with myself, they were out the door. Would the vampire believe me
if I ran after them, told him? No one else did. Or if by chance they did, they hated and feared me for
reading the thoughts con-cealed in people's brains. Arlene had begged me to read her fourth husband's
mind when he'd come in to pick her up one night because she was pretty certain he was thinking of
leaving her and the kids, but I wouldn't because I wanted to keep the one friend I had. And even Arlene
hadn't been able to ask me directly because that would be admitting I had this gift, this curse. People
couldn't admit it. They had to think I was crazy. Which sometimes I almost was!
So I dithered, confused and frightened and angry, and then I knew I just had to act. I was goaded by the
look Mack had given me—as if I was negligible.
I slid down the bar to Jason, where he was sweeping DeeAnne off her feet. She didn't take much
sweeping, pop-ular opinion had it. The trucker from Hammond was glow-ering from her other side.
"Jason," I said urgently. He turned to give me a warning glare. "Listen, is that chain still in the back of the
pickup?"
"Never leave home without it," he said lazily, his eyes scanning my face for signs of trouble. "You going
to fight, Sookie?"
I smiled at him, so used to grinning that it was easy. "I sure hope not," I said cheerfully.
"Hey, you need help?" After all, he was my brother.
"No, thanks," I said, trying to sound reassuring. And I slipped over to Arlene. "Listen, I got to leave a
little early. My tables are pretty thin, can you cover for me?" I didn't think I'd ever asked Arlene such a
thing, though I'd covered for her many times. She, too, offered me help. "That's okay," I said. "I'll be
back in if I can. If you clean my area, I'll do your trailer."
Arlene nodded her red mane enthusiastically.
I pointed to the employee door, to myself, and made my fingers walk, to tell Sam where I was going.
He nodded. He didn't look happy.
So out the back door I went, trying to make my feet quiet on the gravel. The employee parking lot is at
the rear of the bar, through a door leading into the storeroom. The cook's car was there, and Arlene's,
Dawn's, and mine. To my right, the east, Sam's pickup was sitting in front of his trailer.

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I went out of the gravelled employee parking area onto the blacktop that surfaced the much larger
customer lot to the west of the bar. Woods surrounded the clearing in which Merlotte's stood, and the
edges of the parking lot were mostly gravel. Sam kept it well lit, and the surrealistic glare of the high,
parking lot lights made everything look strange.
I saw the Rat Couple's dented red sports car, so I knew they were close.
I found Jason's truck at last. It was black with custom aqua and pink swirls on the sides. He sure did
love to be noticed. I pulled myself up by the tailgate and rummaged around in the bed for his chain, a
thick length of links that he carried in case of a fight. I looped it and carried it pressed to my body so it
wouldn't chink.
I thought a second. The only halfway private spot to which the Rattrays could have lured the vampire
was the end of the parking lot where the trees actually overhung the cars. So I crept in that direction,
trying to move fast and low.
I paused every few seconds and listened. Soon I heard a groan and the faint sounds of voices. I snaked
between the cars, and I spotted them right where I'd figured they'd be.
The vampire was down on the ground on his back, his face contorted in agony, and the gleam of chains
crisscrossed his wrists and ran down to his ankles. Silver. There were two little vials of blood already on
the ground beside Denise's feet, and as I watched, she fixed a new Vacutainer to the needle. The
tourniquet above his elbow dug cruelly into his arm.
Their backs were to me, and the vampire hadn't seen me yet I loosened the coiled chain so a good three
feet of it swung free. Who to attack first? They were both small and vicious.
I remembered Mack's contemptuous dismissal and the fact that he never left me a tip. Mack first.
I'd never actually been in a fight before. Somehow I was positively looking forward to it.
I leapt out from behind a pickup and swung the chain. It thwacked across Mack's back as he knelt
beside his victim. He screamed and jumped up. After a glance, Denise set about getting the third
Vacutainer plugged. Mack's hand dipped down to his boot and came up shining. I gulped. He had a
knife in his hand.
"Uh-oh," I said, and grinned at him.
"You crazy bitch!" he screamed. He sounded like he was looking forward to using the knife. I was too
involved to keep my mental guard up, and I had a clear flash of what Mack wanted to do to me. It drove
me really crazy. I went for him with every intention of hurting him as badly as I could. But he was ready
for me and jumped forward with the knife while I was swinging the chain. He sliced at my arm and just
missed it. The chain, on its recoil, wrapped around his skinny neck like a lover. Mack's yell of triumph
turned into a gurgle. He dropped the knife and clawed at the links with both hands. Losing air, he
dropped to his knees on the rough pavement, yanking the chain from my hand.
Well, there went Jason's chain. I swooped down and scooped up Mack's knife, holding it like I knew
how to use it. Denise had been lunging forward, looking like a redneck witch in the lines and shadows of
the security lights.
She stopped in her tracks when she saw I had Mack'sknife. She cursed and railed and said terrible

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things. I waited till she'd run down to say, "Get. Out. Now."
Denise stared holes of hate in my head. She tried to scoop up the vials of blood, but I hissed at her to
leave them alone. So she pulled Mack to his feet. He was still making choking, gurgling sounds and
holding the chain. Denise kind of dragged him along to their car and shoved him in through the
passenger's side. Yanking some keys from her pocket, Denise threw herself in the driver's seat.
As I heard the engine roar into life, suddenly I realized that the Rats now had another weapon. Faster
than I've ever moved, I ran to the vampire's head and panted, "Push with your feet!" I grabbed him under
the arms and yanked back with all my might, and he caught on and braced his feet and shoved. We were
just inside the tree line when the red car came roaring down at us. Denise missed us by less than a yard
when she had to swerve to avoid hitting a pine. Then I heard the big motor of the Rats' car receding in
the distance.
"Oh, wow," I breathed, and knelt by the vampire because my knees wouldn't hold me up any more. I
breathed heavily for just a minute, trying to get hold of myself. The vampire moved a little, and I looked
over. To my horror, I saw wisps of smoke coming up from his wrists where the silver touched them.
"Oh, you poor thing," I said, angry at myself for not caring for him instantly. Still trying to catch my
breath, I began to unwind the thin bands of silver, which all seemed to be part of one very long chain.
"Poor baby," I whispered, never thinking until later how incongruous that sounded. I have agile fingers,
and I released his wrists pretty quickly. I won-dered how the Rats had distracted him while they got into
position to put them on, and I could feel myself reddening as I pictured it.
The vampire cradled his arms to his chest while I worked on the silver wrapped around his legs. His
ankles had fared better since the drainers hadn't troubled to pull up his jeans legs and put the silver
against his bare skin.
"I'm sorry I didn't get here faster," I said apologetically. "You'll feel better in a minute, right? Do you
want me to leave?"
That made me feel pretty good until he added, "They might come back, and I can't fight yet." His cool
voice was uneven, but I couldn't exactly say I'd heard him panting.
I made a sour face at him, and while he was recovering, I took a few precautions. I sat with my back to
him, giving him some privacy. I know how unpleasant it is to be stared at when you're hurting. I hunkered
down on the pavement, keeping watch on the parking lot. Several cars left, and others came in, but none
came down to our end by the woods. By the movement of the air around me, I knew when the vampire
had sat up.
He didn't speak right away. I turned my head to the left to look at him. He was closer than I'd thought.
His big dark eyes looked into mine. His fangs had retracted; I was a little disappointed about that.
"Thank you," he said stiffly.
So he wasn't thrilled about being rescued by a woman. Typical guy.
Since he was being so ungracious, I felt I could do some-thing rude, too, and I listened to him, opening
my mind com-pletely.
And I heard ... nothing.

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"Oh," I said, hearing the shock in my own voice, hardly knowing what I was saying. "Ican't hear you."
"Thank you!" the vampire said, moving his lips exagger-atedly.
"No, no ... I can hear you speak, but..." and in my ex-citement, I did something I ordinarily would never
do, be-cause it was pushy, and personal, and revealed I was disabled. I turned fully to him and put my
hands on both sides of his white face, and I looked at him intently. I focused with all my energy.Nothing.
It was like having to listen to the radio all the time, to stations you didn't get to select, and then suddenly
tuning in to a wavelength you couldn't receive.
It was heaven.
His eyes were getting wider and darker, though he was holding absolutely still.
"Oh, excuse me," I said with a gasp of embarrassment. I snatched my hands away and resumed staring
at the parkinglot. I began babbling about Mack and Denise, all the time thinking how marvelous it would
be to have a companion I could not hear unless he chose to speak out loud. How beau-tiful his silence
was.
"... so I figured I better come out here to see how you were," I concluded, and had no idea what I'd
been saying.
"You came out here to rescue me. It was brave," he said in a voice so seductive it would have shivered
DeeAnne right out of her red nylon panties.
"Now you cut that out," I said tartly, coming right down to earth with a thud.
He looked astonished for a whole second before his face returned to its white smoothness.
"Aren't you afraid to be alone with a hungry vampire?" he asked, something arch and yet dangerous
running beneath the words.
"Nope."
"Are you assuming that since you came to my rescue that you're safe, that I harbor an ounce of
sentimental feeling after all these years? Vampires often turn on those who trust them. We don't have
human values, you know."
"A lot of humans turn on those who trust them," I pointed out. I can be practical. "I'm not a total fool." I
held out my arm and turned my neck. While he'd been recovering, I'd been wrapping the Rats' chains
around my neck and arms.
He shivered visibly.
"But there's a juicy artery in your groin," he said after a pause to regroup, his voice as slithery as a snake
on a slide.
"Don't you talk dirty," I told him. "I won't listen to that."
Once again we looked at each other in silence. I was afraid I'd never see him again; after all, his first visit

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to Merlotte's hadn't exactly been a success. So I was trying to absorb every detail I could; I would
treasure this encounter and re-hash it for a long, long time. It was rare, a prize. I wanted to touch his skin
again. I couldn't remember how it felt. But that would be going beyond some boundary of manners, and
also maybe start him going on the seductive crap again.
"Would you like to drink the blood they collected?" he asked unexpectedly. "It would be a way for me
to show my gratitude." He gestured at the stoppered vials lying on theblacktop. "My blood is supposed
to improve your sex life and your health."
"I'm healthy as a horse," I told him honestly. "And I have no sex life to speak of. You do what you want
with it."
"You could sell it," he suggested, but I thought he was just waiting to see what I'd say about that.
"I wouldn't touch it," I said, insulted.
"You're different," he said. "What are you?" He seemed to be going through a list of possibilities in his
head from the way he was looking at me. To my pleasure, I could not hear a one of them.
"Well. I'm Sookie Stackhouse, and I'm a waitress," I told him. "What's your name?" I thought I could at
least ask that without being presuming.
"Bill," he said.
Before I could stop myself, I rocked back onto my butt with laughter. "The vampire Bill!" I said. "I
thought it might be Antoine, or Basil, or Langford! Bill!" I hadn't laughed so hard in a long time. "Well,
see ya, Bill. I got to get back to work." I could feel the tense grin snap back into place when I thought of
Merlotte's. I put my hand on Bill's shoulder and pushed up. It was rock hard, and I was on my feet so
fast I had to stop myself from stumbling. I examined my socks to make sure their cuffs were exactly even,
and I looked up and down my outfit to check for wear and tear during the fight with the Rats. I dusted off
my bottom since I'd been sitting on the dirty pavement and gave Bill a wave as I started off across the
parking lot.
It had been a stimulating evening, one with a lot of food for thought. I felt almost as cheerful as my smile
when I considered it.
But Jason was going to be mighty angry about the chain.
after work thatnight, I drove home, which is only about four miles south from the bar. Jason had been
gone (and so had DeeAnne) when I got back to work, and that had been another good thing. I was
reviewing the evening as I drove to my grandmother's house, where I lived. It's right before Tall Pines
cemetery, which lies off a narrow two-lane parish road. My great-great-great grandfather had started the
house, and he'd had ideas about privacy, so to reach it you had to turn off the parish road into the
driveway, go through some woods, and then you arrived at the clearing in which the house stood.
It's sure not any historic landmark, since most of the oldest parts have been ripped down and replaced
over the years, and of course it's got electricity and plumbing and insulation, all that good modern stuff.
But it still has a tin roof that gleams blindingly on sunny days. When the roof needed to be replaced, I
wanted to put regular roofing tiles on it, but my grandmother said no. Though I was paying, it's her house;
so naturally, tin it was.

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Historical or not, I'd lived in this house since I was about seven, and I'd visited it often before then, so I
loved it. It was just a big old family home, too big for Granny and me, I guess. It had a broad front
covered by a screened-in porch, and it was painted white, Granny being a traditionalist all the way. I
went through the big living room, strewn with battered furniture arranged to suit us, and down the hall to
the first bedroom on the left, the biggest.
Adele Hale Stackhouse, my grandmother, was propped up in her high bed, about a million pillows
padding her skinny shoulders. She was wearing a long-sleeved cotton nightgown even in the warmth of
this spring night, and her bedside lamp was still on. There was a book propped in her lap.
"Hey," I said.
"Hi, honey."
My grandmother is very small and very old, but her hair is still thick, and so white it almost has the very
faintest of green tinges. She wears it kind of rolled against her neck during the day, but at night it's loose
or braided. I looked at the cover of her book.
"You reading Danielle Steele again?"
"Oh, that woman can sure tell a story." My grandmother's great pleasures were reading Danielle Steele,
watching her soap operas (which she called her "stories") and attending meetings of the myriad clubs
she'd belonged to all her adult life, it seemed. Her favorites were the Descendants of the Glorious Dead
and the Bon Temps Gardening Society.
"Guess what happened tonight?" I asked her.
"What? You got a date?"
"No," I said, working to keep a smile on my face. "A vampire came into the bar."
"Ooh, did he have fangs?"
I'd seen them glisten in the parking lot lights when the Rats were draining him, but there was no need to
describe that to Gran. "Sure, but they were retracted."
"A vampire right here in Bon Temps." Granny was as pleased as punch. "Did he bite anybody in the
bar?"
"Oh, no, Gran! He just sat and had a glass of red wine. Well, he ordered it, but he didn't drink it. I think
he just wanted some company."
"Wonder where he stays."
"He wouldn't be too likely to tell anyone that."
"No," Gran said, thinking about it a moment. "I guess not. Did you like him?"
Now that was kind of a hard question. I mulled it over. "I don't know. He was real interesting," I said
cautiously.

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"I'd surely love to meet him." I wasn't surprised Gran said this because she enjoyed new things almost as
much as I did. She wasn't one of those reactionaries who'd decided vam-pires were damned right off the
bat. "But I better go to sleep now. I was just waiting for you to come home before I turned out my light."
I bent over to give Gran a kiss, and said, "Night night."
I half-closed her door on my way out and heard the click of the lamp as she turned it off. My cat, Tina,
came from wherever she'd been sleeping to rub against my legs, and I picked her up and cuddled her for
a while before putting her out for the night. I glanced at the clock. It was almost two o'clock, and my bed
was calling me.
My room was right across the hall from Gran's. When I first used this room, after my folks had died,
Gran had moved my bedroom furniture from their house so I'd feel more homey. And here it was still, the
single bed and vanity in white-painted wood, the small chest of drawers.
I turned on my own light and shut the door and began taking off my clothes. I had at least five pair of
black shorts and many, many white T-shirts, since those tended to getstained so easily. No telling how
many pairs of white socks were rolled up in my drawer. So I didn't have to do the wash tonight. I was
too tired for a shower. I did brush my teeth and wash the makeup off my face, slap on some moisturizer,
and take the band out of my hair.
I crawled into bed in my favorite Mickey Mouse sleep T-shirt, which came almost to my knees. I turned
on my side, like I always do, and I relished the silence of the room. Al-most everyone's brain is turned off
in the wee hours of the night, and the vibrations are gone, the intrusions do not have to be repelled. With
such peace, I only had time to think of the vampire's dark eyes, and then I fell into the deep sleep of
exhaustion.
BYLUNCHTIME THE next day I was in my folding alu-minum chaise out in the front yard, getting
browner by the second. I was in my favorite white strapless two-piece, and it was a little roomier than
last summer, so I was pleased as punch.
Then I heard a vehicle coming down the drive, and Jason's black truck with its pink and aqua blazons
pulled up to within a yard of my feet.
Jason climbed down—did I mention the truck sports those high tires?—to stalk toward me. He was
wearing his usual work clothes, a khaki shirt and pants, and he had his sheathed knife clipped to his belt,
like most of the county road workers did. Just by the way he walked, I knew he was in a huff.
I put my dark glasses on.
"Why didn't you tell me you beat up the Rattrays last night?" My brother threw himself into the aluminum
yard chair by my chaise. "Where's Gran?" he asked belatedly.
"Hanging out the laundry," I said. Gran used the dryer in a pinch, but she really liked hanging the wet
clothes out in the sun. Of course the clothesline was in the backyard, where clotheslines should be. "She's
fixing country-fried steak and sweet potatoes and green beans she put up last year, for lunch," I added,
knowing that would distract Jason a little bit. I hoped Gran stayed out back. I didn't want her to hear this

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conversation. "Keep your voice low," I reminded him.
"Rene Lenier couldn't wait till I got to work this morning to tell me all about it. He was over to the
Rattrays' trailer last night to buy him some weed, and Denise drove up like she wanted to kill someone.
Rene said he liked to have gotten killed, she was so mad. It took both Rene and Denise to get Mack into
the trailer, and then they took him to the hospital in Monroe." Jason glared at me accusingly.
"Did Rene tell you that Mack came after me with a knife?" I asked, deciding attacking was the best way
of handling this. I could tell Jason's pique was due in large part to the fact that he had heard about this
from someone else.
"If Denise told Rene, he didn't mention it to me," Jason said slowly, and I saw his handsome face darken
with rage. "He came after you with a knife?"
"So I had to defend myself," I said, as if it were matter-of-fact. "And he took your chain." This was all
true, if a little skewed.
"I came in to tell you," I continued, "but by the time I got back in the bar, you were gone with DeeAnne,
and since I was fine, it just didn't seem worth tracking you down. I knew you'd feel obliged to go after
him if I told you about the knife," I added diplomatically. There was a lot more truth in that, since Jason
dearly loves a fight.
"What the hell were you doing out there anyway?" he asked, but he had relaxed, and I knew he was
accepting this.
"Did you know that, in addition to selling drugs, the Rats are vampire drainers?"
Now he was fascinated. "No... so?"
"Well, one of my customers last night was a vampire, and they were draining him out in Merlotte's
parking lot! I couldn't have that."
"There's a vampire here in Bon Temps?"
"Yep. Even if you don't want a vampire for your best friend, you can't let trash like the Rats drain them.
It's not like siphoning gas out of a car. And they would have left him out in the woods to die." Though the
Rats hadn't told me their intentions, that was my bet. Even if they'd put him under cover so he could
survive the day, a drained vampire took at least twenty years to recover, at least that's what onehad said
onOprah. And that's if another vampire took care of him.
"The vampire was in the bar when I was there?" Jason asked, dazzled.
"Uh-huh. The dark-haired guy sitting with the Rats."
Jason grinned at my epithet for the Rattrays. But he hadn't let go of the night before, yet. "How'd you
know he was a vampire?" he asked, but when he looked at me, I could tell he was wishing he had bitten
his tongue.
"I just knew," I said in my flattest voice.
"Right." And we shared a whole unspoken conversation.

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"Homulka doesn't have a vampire," Jason said thought-fully. He tilted his face back to catch the sun, and
I knew we were off dangerous ground.
"True," I agreed. Homulka was the town Bon Temps loved to hate. We'd been rivals in football,
basketball, and histor-ical significance for generations.
"Neither does Roedale," Gran said from behind us, and Jason and I both jumped. I give Jason credit, he
jumps up and gives Gran a hug everytime he sees her.
"Gran, you got enough food in the oven for me?"
"You and two others," Gran said. Our grandmother smiled up at Jason. She was not blind to his faults
(or mine), but she loved him. "I just got a phone call from Everlee Mason. She was telling me you
hooked up with DeeAnne last night."
"Boy oh boy, can't do anything in this town without get-ting caught," Jason said, but he wasn't really
angry.
'That DeeAnne," Gran said warningly as we all started into the house, "she's been pregnant one time I
know of. You just take care she doesn't have one of yours, you'll be paying the rest of your life. Course,
that may be the only way I get great-grandchildren!"
Gran had the food ready on the table, so after Jason hung up his hat we sat down and said grace. Then
Gran and Jason began gossiping with each other (though they called it "catching up") about people in our
little town and parish. My brother worked for the state, supervising road crews. It seemed to me like
Jason's day consisted of driving around in a state pickup, clocking off work, and then driving aroundall
night in his own pickup. Rene was on one of the work crews Jason oversaw, and they'd been to high
school to-gether. They hung around with Hoyt Fortenberry a lot.
"Sookie, I had to replace the hot water heater in the house," Jason said suddenly. He lives in my parents'
old house, the one we'd been living in when they died in a flash flood. We lived with Gran after that, but
when Jason got through his two years of college and went to work for the state, he moved back into the
house, which on paper is half mine.
"You need any money on that?" I asked.
"Naw, I got it."
We both make salaries, but we also have a little income from a fund established when an oil well was
sunk on my parents' property. It played out in a few years, but my parents and then Gran made sure the
money was invested. It saved Jason and me a lot of struggle, that padding. I don't know how Gran could
have raised us if it hadn't been for that money. She was determined not to sell any land, but her own
income is not much more than social security. That's one reason I don't get an apartment. If I get
groceries when I'm living with her, that's reasonable, to her; but if I buy gro-ceries and bring them to her
house and leave them on her table and go home to my house, that's charity and that makes her mad.
"What kind did you get?" I asked, just to show interest.
He was dying to tell me; Jason's an appliance freak, and he wanted to describe his comparison shopping
for a new water heater in detail. I listened with as much attention as I could muster.

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And then he interrupted himself. "Hey Sook, you remem-ber Maudette Pickens?"
"Sure," I said, surprised. "We graduated in the same class."
"Somebody killed Maudette in her apartment last night."
Gran and I were riveted. "When?" Grand asked, puzzled that she hadn't heard already.
"They just found her this very morning in her bedroom. Her boss tried to call her to find out why she
hadn't shown up for work yesterday and today and got no answer, so he rode over and got the manager
up, and they unlocked the place. You know she had the apartment across from Dee-Anne's?" Bon
Temps had only one bona fide apartment com-plex, a three-building, two-story U-shaped grouping, so
we knew exactly where he meant.
"She got killed there?" I felt ill. I remembered Maudette clearly. Maudette had had a heavy jaw and a
square bottom, pretty black hair and husky shoulders. Maudette had been a plodder, never bright or
ambitious. I thought I recalled her working at the Grabbit Kwik, a gas station/convenience store.
"Yeah, she'd been working there for at least a year, I guess," Jason confirmed.
"How was it done?" My grandmother had that squnched, give-it-to-me-quick look with which nice
people ask for bad news.
"She had some vampire bites on her—uh—inner thighs," my brother said, looking down at his plate.
"But that wasn't what killed her. She was strangled. DeeAnne told me Mau-dette liked to go to that
vampire bar in Shreveport when she had a couple of days off, so maybe that's where she got the bites.
Might not have beenSookie's vampire."
"Maudette was a fang-banger?" I felt queasy, imagining slow, chunky Maudette draped in the exotic
black dresses fang-bangers affected.
"What's that?" asked Gran. She must have missedSally-Jessy the day the phenomenon was explored.
"Men and women that hang around with vampires and enjoy being bitten. Vampire groupies. They don't
last too long, I think, because they want to be bitten too much, and sooner or later they get that one bite
too many."
"But a bite didn't kill Maudette." Gran wanted to be sure she had it straight.
"Nope, strangling." Jason had begun finishing his lunch.
"Don't you always get gas at the Grabbit?" I asked.
"Sure. So do a lot of people."
"And didn't you hang around with Maudette some?" Gran asked.
"Well, in a way of speaking," Jason said cautiously.
I took that to mean he'd bedded Maudette when he couldn't find anyone else.

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"I hope the sheriff doesn't want to talk to you," Gran said, shaking her head as if indicating "no" would
make it less likely.
"What?" Jason was turning red, looking defensive.
"You see Maudette in the store all the time when you get your gas, you so-to-speak date her, then she
winds up dead in an apartment you're familiar with," I summarized. It wasn't much, but it was something,
and there were so few mysterious homicides in Bon Temps that I thought every stone would be turned in
its investigation.
"I ain't the only one who fills the bill. Plenty of other guys get their gas there, and all of them know
Maudette."
"Yeah, but in what sense?" Gran asked bluntly. "She wasn't a prostitute, was she? So she will have
talked about who she saw."
"She just liked to have a good time, she wasn't a pro." It was good of Jason to defend Maudette,
considering what I knew of his selfish character. I began to think a little better of my big brother. "She
was kinda lonely, I guess," he added.
Jason looked at both of us, then, and saw we were sur-prised and touched.
"Speaking of prostitutes," he said hastily, "there's one in Monroe specializes in vampires. She keeps a
guy standing by with a stake in case one gets carried away. She drinks synthetic blood to keep her blood
supply up."
That was a pretty definite change of subject, so Gran and I tried to think of a question we could ask
without being indecent.
"Wonder how much she charges?" I ventured, and when Jason told us the figure he'd heard, we both
gasped.
Once we got off the topic of Maudette's murder, lunch went about as usual, with Jason looking at his
watch and exclaiming that he had to leave just when it was time to do the dishes.
But Gran's mind was still running on vampires, I found out. She came into my room later, when I was
putting on my makeup to go to work.
"How old you reckon the vampire is, the one you met?"
"I have no idea, Gran." I was putting on my mascara, looking wide-eyed and trying to hold still so I
wouldn't poke myself in the eye, so my voice came out funny, as if I was trying out for a horror movie.
"Do you suppose ... he might remember the War?"
I didn't need to ask which war. After all, Gran was a charter member of the Descendants of the Glorious
Dead.
"Could be," I said, turning my face from side to side to make sure my blush was even.

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"You think he might come to talk to us about it? We could have a special meeting."
"At night," I reminded her.
"Oh. Yes, it'd have to be." The Descendants usually met at noon at the library and brought a bag lunch.
I thought about it. It would be plain rude to suggest to the vampire that he ought to speak to Gran's club
because I'd saved his blood from Drainers, but maybe he would offer if I gave a little hint? I didn't like to,
but I'd do it for Gran. "I'll ask him the next time he comes in," I promised.
"At least he could come talk to me and maybe I could tape his recollections?" Gran said. I could hear
her mind clicking as she thought of what a coup that would be for her. "It would be so interesting to the
other club members," she said piously.
I stifled an impulse to laugh. "I'll suggest it to him," I said. "We'll see."
When I left, Gran was clearly counting her chickens.
Ihadn't thought of Rene Lenier going to Sam with the story of the parking lot fight. Rene'd been a busy
bee, though. When I got to work that afternoon, I assumed the agitation I felt in the air was due to
Maudette's murder. I found out different.
Sam hustled me into the storeroom the minute I came in. He was hopping with anger. He reamed me up
one side and down the other.
Sam had never been mad with me before, and soon I was on the edge of tears.
"And if you think a customer isn't safe, you tell me, andI'll deal with it, not you," he was saying for the
sixth time, when I finally realized that Sam had been scared for me.
I caught that rolling off him before I clamped down firmly on "hearing" Sam. Listening in to your boss led
to disaster.
It had never occurred to me to ask Sam—or anyone else— for help.
"And if you think someone is being harmed in our parking lot, your next move is to call the police, not
step out there yourself like a vigilante," Sam huffed. His fair complection, always ruddy, was redder than
ever, and his wiry golden hair looked as if he hadn't combed it.
"Okay," I said, trying to keep my voice even and my eyes wide open so the tears wouldn't roll out. "Are
you gonna fire me?"
"No! No!" he exclaimed, apparently even angrier. "I don't want to lose you!" He gripped my shoulders
and gave me a little shake. Then he stood looking at me with wide, crackling blue eyes, and I felt a surge
of heat rushing out from him. Touching accelerates my disability, makes it imperative that I hear the
person touching. I stared right into his eyes for a long moment, then I remembered myself, and I jumped
back as his hands dropped away.

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I whirled and left the storeroom, spooked.
I'd learned a couple of disconcerting things. Sam desired me; and I couldn't hear his thoughts as clearly
as I could other people's. I'd had waves of impressions of how he was feeling, but not thoughts. More
like wearing a mood ring than getting a fax.
So, what did I do about either piece of information?
Absolutely nothing.
I'd never looked on Sam as a beddable man before—or at least not beddable by me—for a lot of
reasons. But the sim-plest one was that I never looked at anyone that way, not because I don't have
hormones—boy, do I have hormones— but they are constantly tamped down because sex, for me, is a
disaster. Can you imagine knowing everything your sex partner is thinking? Right. Along the order of
"Gosh, look at that mole ... her butt is a little big ... wish she'd move to the right a little ... why doesn't she
take the hint and ... ?" You get the idea. It's chilling to the emotions, believe me.
And during sex, there is simply no way to keep a mental guard up.
Another reason is that I like Sam for a boss, and I like my job, which gets me out and keeps me active
and earning so I won't turn into the recluse my grandmother fears I'll be-come. Working in an office is
hard for me, and college was simply impossible because of the grim concentration neces-sary. It just
drained me.
So, right now, I wanted to mull over the rush of desire I'd felt from him. It wasn't like he'd made me a
verbal propo-sition or thrown me down on the storeroom floor. I'd felt his feelings, and I could ignore
them if I chose. I appreciated the delicacy of this, and wondered if Sam had touched me on purpose, if
he actually knew what I was.
I took care not be alone with him, but I have to admit I was pretty shaken that night.
THE NEXT TWO nights were better. We fell back into our comfortable relationship. I was relieved. I
was disap-pointed. I was also run off my feet since Maudette's murder sparked a business boom at
Merlotte's. All sorts of rumors were buzzing around Bon Temps, and the Shreveport news team did a
little piece on Maudette Picken's grisly death. Though I didn't attend her funeral, my grandmother did,
and she said the church was jam-packed. Poor lumpy Maudette, with her bitten thighs, was more
interesting in death than she'd ever been in life.
I was about to have two days off, and I was worried I'd miss connecting with the vampire, Bill. I needed
to relay my grandmother's request. He hadn't returned to the bar, and I began to wonder if he would.
Mack and Denise hadn't been back in Merlotte's either, but Rene Lenier and Hoyt Fortenberry made
sure I knew they'd threatened me with horrible things. I can't say I was seriously alarmed. Criminal trash
like the Rats roamed the highways and trailer parks of America, not smart enough or moral enough to
settle down to productive living. They never made a positive mark on the world, or amounted to a hill of
beans, to my way of thinking. I shrugged off Rene's warn-ings.

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But he sure enjoyed relaying them. Rene Lenier was small like Sam, but where Sam was ruddy and
blond, Rene was swarthy and had a bushy headful of rough, black hair threaded with gray. Rene often
came by the bar to drink a beer and visit with Arlene because (as he was fond of telling anyone in the
bar) she was his favorite ex-wife. He had three. Hoyt Fortenbeny was more of a cipher than Rene. He
was neither dark nor fair, neither big nor little. He always seemed cheerful and always tipped decent. He
admired my brother Jason far beyond what Jason deserved, in my opinion.
I was glad Rene and Hoyt weren't there the night the vam-pire returned.
He sat at the same table.
Now that the vampire was actually in front of me, I felt a little shy. I found I'd forgotten the almost
imperceptible glow of his skin. I'd exaggerated his height and the clear-cut lines of his mouth.
"What can I get you?" I asked.
He looked up at me. I had forgotten, too, the depth of his eyes. He didn't smile or blink; he was so
immobile. For the second time, I relaxed into his silence. When I let down my guard, I could feel my face
relax. It was as good as getting a massage (I am guessing).
"What are you?" he asked me. It was the second time he'd wanted to know.
"I'm a waitress," I said, again deliberately misunderstand-ing him. I could feel my smile snap back into
place again. My little bit of peace vanished.
"Red wine," he ordered, and if he was disappointed I couldn't tell by his voice.
"Sure," I said. "The synthetic blood should come in on the truck tomorrow. Listen, could I talk to you
after work? I have a favor to ask you."
"Of course. I'm in your debt." And he sure didn't sound happy about it.
"Not a favor for me!" I was getting miffed myself. "For my grandmother. If you'll be up—well, I guess
you will be— when I get off work at one-thirty, would you very much mindmeeting me at the employee
door at the back of the bar?" I nodded toward it, and my ponytail bounced around my shoulders. His
eyes followed the movement of my hair.
"I'd be delighted."
I didn't know if he was displaying the courtesy Gran in-sisted was the standard in bygone times, or if he
was plain old mocking me.
I resisted the temptation to stick out my tongue at him or blow a raspberry. I spun on my heel and
marched back to the bar. When I brought him his wine, he tipped me 20 per-cent. Soon after that, I
looked over at his table only to realize he'd vanished. I wondered if he'd keep his word.
Arlene and Dawn left before I was ready to go, for one reason and another; mostly because all the
napkin holders in my area proved to be half-empty. As I retrieved my purse from the locked cabinet in
Sam's office, where I stow it while I work, I called good-bye to my boss. I could hear him clank-ing
around in the men's room, probably trying to fix the leaky toilet. I stepped into the ladies' room for a

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second to check my hair and makeup.
When I stepped outside I noticed that Sam had already switched off the customer parking lot lights.
Only the secu-rity light on the electricity pole in front of his trailer illu-minated the employee parking lot.
To the amusement of Arlene and Dawn, Sam had put in a yard and planted box-wood in front of his
trailer, and they were constantly teasing him about the neat line of his hedge.
I thought it was pretty.
As usual, Sam's truck was parked in front of his trailer, so my car was the only one left in the lot.
I stretched, looking from side to side. No Bill. I was sur-prised at how disappointed I was. I had really
expected him to be courteous, even if his heart (did he have one?) wasn't in it.
Maybe, I thought with a smile, he'd jump out of a tree, or appear with a poof! in front of me draped in a
red-lined black cape. But nothing happened. So I trudged over to my car.
I'd hoped for a surprise, but not the one I got.
Mack Rattray jumped out from behind my car and in one stride got close enough to clip me in the jaw.
He didn't holdback one little bit, and I went down onto the gravel like a sack of cement. I let out a yell
when I went down, but the ground knocked all the air out of me and some skin off of me, and I was
silent and breathless and helpless. Then I saw Denise, saw her swing back her heavy boot, had just
enough warning to roll into a ball before the Rattrays began kicking me.
The pain was immediate, intense, and unrelenting. I threw my arms over my face instinctively, taking the
beating on my forearms, legs, and my back.
I think I was sure, during the first few blows, that they'd stop and hiss warnings and curses at me and
leave. But I remember the exact moment I realized that they intended to kill me.
I could lie there passively and take a beating, but I would not lie there and be killed.
The next time a leg came close I lunged and grabbed it and held on for my life. I was trying to bite, trying
to at least mark one of them. I wasn't even sure whose leg I had.
Then, from behind me, I heard a growl. Oh, no, they've brought a dog, I thought. The growl was
definitely hostile. If I'd had any leeway with my emotions, the hair would have stood up on my scalp.
I took one more kick to the spine, and then the beating stopped.
The last kick had done something dreadful to me. I could hear my own breathing, stertorous, and a
strange bubbling sound that seemed to be coming from my own lungs.
"What the hell is that?" Mack Rattray asked, and he sounded absolutely terrified.
I heard the growl again, closer, right behind me. And from another direction, I heard a sort of snarl.
Denise began wail-ing, Mack was cursing. Denise yanked her leg from my grasp, which had grown very
weak. My arms flopped to the ground. They seemed to be beyond my control. Though my vision was
cloudy, I could see that my right arm was broken. My face felt wet. I was scared to continue evaluating
my injuries.

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Mack began screaming, and then Denise, and there seemed to be all kinds of activity going on around
me, but I couldn'tmove. My only view was my broken arm and my battered knees and the darkness
under my car.
Some time later there was silence. Behind me, the dog whined. A cold nose poked my ear, and a warm
tongue licked it. I tried to raise my hand to pet the dog that had undoubtedly saved my life, but I couldn't.
I could hear my-self sigh. It seemed to come from a long way away.
Facing the fact, I said, "I'm dying." It began to seem more and more real to me. The toads and crickets
that had been making the most of the night had fallen silent at all the ac-tivity and noise in the parking lot,
so my little voice came out clearly and fell into the darkness. Oddly enough, soon after that I heard two
voices.
Then a pair of knees covered in bloody blue jeans came into my view. The vampire Bill leaned over so I
could look into his face. There was blood smeared on his mouth, and his fangs were out, glistening white
against his lower lip. I tried to smile at him, but my face wasn't working right.
"I'm going to pick you up," Bill said. He sounded calm.
"I'll die if you do," I whispered.
He looked me over carefully. "Not just yet," he said, after this evaluation. Oddly enough, this made me
feel better; no telling how many injuries he'd seen in his lifetime, I figured.
"This will hurt," he warned me.
It was hard to imagine anything that wouldn't.
His arms slid under me before I had time to get afraid. I screamed, but it was a weak effort.
"Quick," said a voice urgently.
"We're going back in the woods out of sight," Bill said, cradling my body to him as if it weighed nothing.
Was he going to bury me back there, out of sight? After he'd just rescued me from the Rats? I almost
didn't care.
It was only a small relief when he laid me down on a carpet of pine needles in the darkness of the
woods. In the distance, I could see the glow of the light in the parking lot. I felt my hair trickling blood,
and I felt the pain of my broken arm and the agony of deep bruises, but what was most fright-ening was
what I didn't feel.
I didn't feel my legs.
My abdomen felt full, heavy. The phrase "internal bleeding" lodged in my thoughts, such as they were.
"You will die unless you do as I say," Bill told me.
"Sorry, don't want to be a vampire," I said, and my voice was weak and thready.

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"No, you won't be," he said more gently. "You'll heal. Quickly. I have a cure. But you have to be
willing."
"Then trot out the cure," I whispered. "I'm going." I could feel the pull the grayness was exerting on me.
In the little part of my mind that was still receiving signals from the world, I heard Bill grunt as if he'd
been hurt. Then something was pressed up against my mouth.
"Drink," he said.
I tried to stick out my tongue, managed. He was bleeding, squeezing to encourage the flow of blood
from his wrist into my mouth. I gagged. But I wanted to live. I forced myself to swallow. And swallow
again.
Suddenly the blood tasted good, salty, the stuff of life. My unbroken arm rose, my hand clamped the
vampire's wrist to my mouth. I felt better with every swallow. And after a min-ute, I drifted off to sleep.
When I woke up, I was still in the woods, still lying on the ground. Someone was stretched out beside
me; it was the vampire. I could see his glow. I could feel his tongue moving on my head. He was licking
my head wound. I could hardly begrudge him.
"Do I taste different from other people?" Iasked.
"Yes," he said in a thick voice. "What are you?"
It was the third time he'd asked. Third time's the charm, Gran always said.
"Hey, I'm not dead," I said. I suddenly remembered I'd expected to check out for good. I wiggled my
arm, the one that had been broken. It was weak, but it wasn't flopping any longer. I could feel my legs,
and I wiggled them, too. I breathed in and out experimentally and was pleased with the resulting mild
ache. I struggled to sit up. That proved to be quite an effort, but not an impossibility. It was like my first
fever-free day after I'd had pneumonia as a kid. Feeble but blissful. I was aware I'd survived something
awful.
Before I finished straightening, he'd put his arms under me and cradled me to him. He leaned back
against a tree. Ifelt very comfortable sitting on his lap, my head against his chest.
"What I am, is telepathic," I said. "I can hear people's thoughts."
"Even mine?" He sounded merely curious.
"No. That's why I like you so much," I said, floating on a sea of pinkish well-being. I couldn't seem to be
bothered with camouflaging my thoughts.
I felt his chest rumble as he laughed. The laugh was a little rusty.
"I can't hear you at all," I blathered on, my voice dreamy. "You have no idea how peaceful that is. After
a lifetime of blah, blah, blah, to hear ... nothing."
"How do you manage going out with men? With men your age, their only thought is still surely how to get
you into bed."

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"Well, I don't. Manage. And frankly, at any age, I think their goal is get a woman in bed. I don't date.
Everyone thinks I'm crazy, you know, because I can't tell them the truth; which is, that I'm driven crazy
by all these thoughts, all these heads. I had a few dates when I started working at the bar, guys who
hadn't heard about me. But it was the same as always. You can't concentrate on being comfortable with
a guy, or getting a head of steam up, when you can hear they're wondering if you dye your hair, or
thinking that your butt's not pretty, or imagining what your boobs look like."
Suddenly I felt more alert, and I realized how much of myself I was revealing to this creature.
"Excuse me," I said. "I didn't mean to burden you with my problems. Thank you for saving me from the
Rats."
"It was my fault they had a chance to get you at all," he said. I could tell there was rage just under the
calm surface of his voice. "If I had had the courtesy to be on time, it would not have happened. So I
owed you some of my blood. I owed you the healing."
"Are they dead?" To my embarrassment, my voice sounded squeaky.
"Oh, yes."
I gulped. I couldn't regret that the world was rid of theRats. But I had to look this straight in the face, I
couldn't dodge the realization that I was sitting in the lap of a mur-derer. Yet I was quite happy to sit
there, his arms around me.
"I should worry about this, but I'm not," I said, before I knew what I was going to say. I felt that rusty
laugh again.
"Sookie, why did you want to talk to me tonight?"
I had to think back hard. Though I was miraculously re-covered from the beating physically, I felt a little
hazy men-tally.
"My grandmother is real anxious to know how old you are," I said hesitantly. I didn't know how
personal a question that was to a vampire. The vampire in question was stroking my back as though he
were soothing a kitten.
"I was made vampire in 1870, when I was thirty human years old." I looked up; his glowing face was
expressionless, his eyes pits of blackness in the dark woods.
"Did you fight in the War?"
"Yes."
"I have the feeling you're gonna get mad. But it would make her and her club so happy if you'd tell them
a little bit about the War, about what it was really like."
"Club?"
"She belongs to Descendants of the Glorious Dead."

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"Glorious dead." The vampire's voice was unreadable, but I could tell, sure enough, he wasn't happy.
"Listen, you wouldn't have to tell them about the maggots and the infections and the starvation," I said.
"They have their own picture of the War, and though they're not stupid people—they've lived through
other wars—they would like to know more about the way people lived then, and uniforms and troop
movements."
"Clean things."
I took a deep breath. "Yep."
"Would it make you happy if I did this?"
"What difference does that make? It would make Gran happy, and since you're in Bon Temps and seem
to want to live around here, it would be a good public relations move for you,"
"Would it make you happy?"
He was not a guy you could evade. "Well, yes."
"Then I'll do it."
"Gran says to please eat before you come," I said.
Again I heard the rumbling laugh, deeper this time.
"I'm looking forward to meeting her now. Can I call on you some night?"
"Ah. Sure. I work my last night tomorrow night, and the day after I'm off for two days, so Thursday
would be a good night." I lifted my arm to look at my watch. It was running, but the glass was covered
with dried blood. "Oh, yuck," I said, wetting my finger in my mouth and cleaning the watch face off with
spit. I pressed the button that illuminated the hands, and gasped when I saw what time it was.
"Oh, gosh, I got to get home. I hope Gran went to sleep."
"She must worry about you being out so late at night by yourself," Bill observed. He sounded
disapproving. Maybe he was thinking of Maudette? I had a moment of deep un-ease, wondering if in fact
Bill had known her, if she'd invited him to come home with her. But I rejected the idea because I was
stubbornly unwilling to dwell on the odd, awful, nature of Maudette's life and death; I didn't want that
horror to cast a shadow on my little bit of happiness.
"It's part of my job," I said tartly. "Can't be helped. I don't work nights all the time, anyway. But when I
can, I do."
"Why?" The vampire gave me a shove up to my feet, and then he rose easily from the ground.
"Better tips. Harder work. No time to think."
"But night is more dangerous," he said disapprovingly.
He ought to know. "Now don't you go sounding like my grandmother," I chided him mildly. We had

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almost reached the parking lot.
"I'm older than your grandmother," he reminded me. That brought the conversation up short.
After I stepped out of the woods, I stood staring. The parking lot was as serene and untouched as if
nothing had ever happened there, as if I hadn't been nearly beaten to death on that patch of gravel only
an hour before, as if the Rats hadn't met their bloody end.
The lights in the bar and in Sam's trailer were off.
The gravel was wet, but not bloody.
My purse was sitting on the hood of my car.
"And what about the dog?" I said.
I turned to look at my savior.
He wasn't there.
Chapter 2
I GOT UP very late the next morning, which was not too surprising. Gran had been asleep when I got
home, to my relief, and I was able to climb into my bed without waking her.
1 WAS DRINKING a cup of coffee at the kitchen table and Gran was cleaning out the pantry when the
phone rang. Gran eased her bottom up onto the stool by the counter, her normal chatting perch, to
answer it.
"Hel-lo,"she said. For some reason, she always sounded put out, as if a phone call were the last thing on
earth she wanted. I knew for a fact that wasn't the case.
"Hey, Everlee. No, sitting here talking to Sookie, she just got up. No, I haven't heard any news today.
No, no one called me yet. What? What tornado? Last night was clear. Four Tracks Corner? It did? No!
No, it did not! Really? Both of 'em? Um, um, um. What did Mike Spencer say?"
Mike Spencer was our parish coroner. I began to have a creepy feeling. I finished my coffee and poured
myself an-other cup. I thought I was going to need it.
Gran hung up a minute later. "Sookie, you are not going to believe what has happened!"
I was willing to bet I would believe it.
"What?" I asked, trying not to look guilty.
"No matter how smooth the weather looked last night, a tornado must have touched down at Four
Tracks Corner! It turned over that rent trailer in the clearing there. The couple that was staying in it, they

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both got killed, trapped under the trailer somehow and crushed to a pulp. Mike says he hasn't seen
anything like it."
"Is he sending the bodies for autopsy?"
"Well, I think he has to, though the cause of death seems clear enough, according to Stella. The trailer is
over on its side, their car is halfway on top of it, and trees are pulled up in the yard."
"My God," I whispered, thinking of the strength necessary to accomplish the staging of that scene.
"Honey, you didn't tell me if your friend the vampire came in last night?"
I jumped in a guilty way until I realized that in Gran's mind, she'd changed subjects. She'd been asking
me if I'd seen Bill every day, and now, at last, I could tell her yes— but not with a light heart.
Predictably, Gran was excited out of her gourd. She flut-tered around the kitchen as if Prince Charles
were the ex-pected guest.
"Tomorrow night. Now what time's he coming?" she asked.
"After dark. That's as close as I can get."
"We're on daylight saving time, so that'll be pretty late." Gran considered. "Good, we'll have time to eat
supper and clear it away beforehand. And we'll have all day tomorrow to clean the house. I haven't
cleaned that area rug in a year, I bet!"
"Gran, we're talking about a guy who sleeps in the ground all day," I reminded her. "I don't think he'd
ever look at the rug."
"Well, if I'm not doing it for him, then I'm doing it for me, so I can feel proud," Gran said unanswerably.
"Besides, young lady, how do you know where he sleeps?"
"Good question, Gran. I don't. But he has to keep out of the light and he has to keep safe, so that's my
guess."
Nothing would prevent my grandmother from going into a house-proud frenzy, I realized very shortly.
While I was getting ready for work, she went to the grocery and rented a rug cleaner and set to cleaning.
On my way to Merlotte's, I detoured north a bit and drove by the Four Tracks Corner. It was a
crossroads as old as human habitation of the area. Now formalized by road signs and pavement, local
lore said it was the intersection of two hunting trails. Sooner or later, there would be ranch-style houses
and strip malls lining the roads, I guessed, but for now it was woods and the hunting was still good,
according to Jason.
Since there was nothing to prevent me, I drove down the rutted path that led to the clearing where the
Rattrays' rented trailer had stood. I stopped my car and stared out the wind-shield, appalled. The trailer,
a very small and old one, lay crushed ten feet behind its original location. The Rattrays' dented red car
was still resting on one end of the accordian-pleated mobile home. Bushes and debris were littered
around the clearing, and the woods behind the trailer showed signs of a great force passing through;
branches snapped off, the top of one pine hanging down by a thread of bark. There were clothes up in
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I got out slowly and looked around me. The damage was simply incredible, especially since I knew it
hadn't been caused by a tornado; Bill the vampire had staged this scene to account for the deaths of the
Rattrays.
An old Jeep bumped its way down the ruts to come to a stop by me.
"Well, Sookie Stackhouse!" called Mike Spencer, "What you doing here, girl? Ain't you got work to go
to?"
"Yes, sir. I knew the Rat—the Rattrays. This is just an awful thing." I thought that was sufficiently
ambiguous. I could see now that the sheriff was with Mike.
"An awful thing. Yes, well. I did hear," Sheriff Bud Dear-born said as climbed down out of the Jeep,
"that you and Mack and Denise didn't exactly see eye to eye in the parking lot of Merlotte's, last week."
I felt a cold chill somewhere around the region of my liver as the two men ranged themselves in front of
me.
Mike Spencer was the funeral director of one of Bon Temps' two funeral homes. As Mike was always
quick and definite in pointing out, anyone who wanted could be buried by Spencer and Sons Funeral
Home; but only white people seemed to want to. Likewise, only people of color chose to be buried at
Sweet Rest. Mike himself was a heavy middle-aged man with hair and mustache the color of weak tea,
and a fondness for cowboy boots and string ties that he could not wear when he was on duty at Spencer
and Sons. He was wearing them now.
Sheriff Dearborn, who had the reputation of being a good man, was a little older than Mike, but fit and
tough from his thick gray hair to his heavy shoes. The sheriff had a mashed-in face and quick brown eyes.
He had been a good friend of my father's.
"Yes, sir, we had us a disagreement," I said frankly in my down-homiest voice.
"You want to tell me about it?" The sheriff pulled out a Marlboro and lit it with a plain, metal lighter.
And I made a mistake. I should have just told him. I was supposed to be crazy, and some thought me
simple, too. But for the life of me, I could see no reason to explain myself to Bud Dearborn. No reason,
except good sense.
"Why?" I asked.
His small brown eyes were suddenly sharp, and the ami-able air vanished.
"Sookie," he said, with a world of disappointment in his voice. I didn't believe in it for a minute.
"I didn't do this," I said, waving my hand at the destruc-tion.
"No, you didn't," he agreed. "But just the same, they die the week after they have a fight with someone, I
feel I should ask questions."
I was reconsidering staring him down. It would feel good, but I didn't think feeling good was worth it. It
was becoming apparent to me that a reputation for simplicity could be handy.

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I may be uneducated and unworldly, but I'm not stupid or unread.
"Well, they were hurting my friend," I confessed, hanging my head and eyeing my shoes.
"Would that be this vampire that's living at the old Comp-ton house?" Mike Spencer and Bud Dearborn
exchanged glances.
"Yes, sir." I was surprised to hear where Bill was living, but they didn't know that. From years of
deliberately not reacting to things I heard that I didn't want to know, I have good facial control. The old
Compton house was right across the fields from us, on the same side of the road. Between our houses
lay only the woods and the cemetery. How handy for Bill, I thought, and smiled.
"Sookie Stackhouse, your granny is letting you associate with that vampire?" Spencer said unwisely.
"You can sure talk to her about that," I suggested mali-ciously, hardly able to wait to hear what Gran
would say when someone suggested she wasn't taking care of me. "You know, the Rattrays were trying
to drain Bill."
"So the vampire was being drained by the Rattrays? And you stopped them?" interrupted the sheriff.
"Yes," I said and tried to look resolute.
"Vampire drainingis illegal," he mused.
"Isn't it murder, to kill a vampire that hasn't attacked you?" I asked.
I may have pushed the naivete a little too hard.
"You know damn good and well it is, though I don't agree with that law. It is a law, and I will uphold it,"
the sheriff said stiffly.
"So the vampire just let them leave, without threatening vengeance? Saying anything like he wished they
were dead?" Mike Spencer was being stupid.
"That's right." I smiled at both of them and then looked at my watch. I remembered the blood on its face,
my blood, beaten out of me by the Rattrays. I had to look through that blood to read the time.
"Excuse me, I have to get to work," I said. "Good-bye, Mr. Spencer, Sheriff."
"Good-bye, Sookie," Sheriff Dearborn said. He looked like he had more to ask me, but couldn't think of
how to put it. I could tell he wasn't totally happy with the look of the scene,and I doubted any tornado
had shown up on radar anywhere. Nonetheless, there was the trailer, there was the car, there were the
trees, and the Rattrays had been dead under them. What could you decide but that the tornado had killed
them? I guessed the bodies had been sent for an autopsy, and I wondered how much could be told by
such a procedure under the circumstances.
The human mind is an amazing thing. Sheriff Dearborn must have known that vampires are very strong.
But he just couldn't imagine how strong one could be: strong enough to turn over a trailor, crush it. It was
even hard for me to com-prehend, and I knew good and well that no tornado had touched down at Four
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The whole bar was humming with the news of the deaths. Maudette's murder had taken a backseat to
Denise and Mack's demises. I caught Sam eyeing me a couple of times, and I thought about the night
before and wondered how much he knew. But I was scared to ask in case he hadn't seen anything. I
knew there were things that had happened the night before that I hadn't yet explained to my own
sat-isfaction, but I was so grateful to be alive that I put off thinking of them.
I'd never smiled so hard while I toted drinks, I'd never made change so briskly, I'd never gotten orders
so exactly. Even ol' bushy-haired Rene didn't slow me down, though he insisted on dragging me into his
long-winded conversations every time I came near the table he was sharing with Hoyt and a couple of
other cronies.
Rene played the role of crazy Cajun some of the time, though any Cajun accent he might assume was
faked. His folks had let their heritage fade. Every woman he'd married had been hard-living and wild. His
brief hitch with Arlene had been whenshe was young and childless, and she'd told me that from time to
time she'd done things then that curled her hair to think about now. She'd grown up since then, but Rene
hadn't. Arlene was sure fond of him, to my amazement.
Everyone in the bar was excited that night because of the unusual happenings in Bon Temps. A woman
had been mur-dered, and it was a mystery; usually murders in Bon Temps are easily solved. And a
couple had died violently by a freakof nature. I attributed what happened next to that excitement. This is
a neighborhood bar, with a few out of towners who pass through on a regular basis, and I've never had
much problem with unwanted attention. But that night one of the men at a table next to Rene and Hoyt's,
a heavy blond man with a broad, red face, slid his hand up the leg of my shorts when I was bringing their
beer.
That doesn't fly at Merlotte's.
I thought of bringing the tray down on his head when I felt the hand removed. I felt someone standing
right behind me. I turned my head and saw Rene, who had left his chair without my even realizing it. I
followed his arm down and saw that his hand was gripping the blond's and squeezing. The blond's red
face was turning a mottled mixture.
"Hey, man, let go!" the blond protested. "I didn't mean nothing."
"You don't touch anyone who works here. That's the rule." Rene might be short and slim, but anyone
there would have put his money on our local boy over the beefier visitor.
"Okay, okay."
"Apologize to the lady."
"To Crazy Sookie?" His voice was incredulous. He must have been here before.
Rene's hand must have tightened. I saw tears spring into the blond's eyes.
"I'm sorry, Sookie, okay?"
I nodded as regally as I could. Rene let go of the man's hand abruptly and jerked his thumb to tell the
guy to take a hike. The blond lost no time throwing himself out the door. His companion followed.

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"Rene, you should have let me handle that myself," I said to him very quietly when it seemed the patrons
had resumed their conversations. We'd given the gossip mill enough grist for at least a couple of days.
"But I appreciate you standing up for me."
"I don't want no one messing with Arlene's friend," Rene said matter-of-factly. "Merlotte's is a nice
place, we all want to keep it nice. 'Sides, sometimes you remind me of Cindy, you know?"
Cindy was Rene's sister. She'd moved to Baton Rouge ayear or two ago. Cindy was blond and
blue-eyed: beyond that I couldn't think of a similarity. But it didn't seem polite to say so. "You see Cindy
much?" I asked. Hoyt and the other man at the table were exchanging Shreveport Captains scores and
statistics.
"Every so now and then," Rene said, shaking his head as if to say he'd like it to be more often. "She
works in a hospital cafeteria."
I patted him on the shoulder. "I gotta go work."
When I reached the bar to get my next order, Sam raised his eyebrows at me. I widened my eyes to
show how amazed I was at Rene's intervention, and Sam shrugged slightly, as if to say there was no
accounting for human behavior.
But when I went behind the bar to get some more napkins, I noticed he'd pulled out the baseball bat he
kept below the till for emergencies.
GRAN KEPT ME busy all the next day. She dusted and vacuumed and mopped, and I scrubbed the
bathrooms—did vampires even need to use the bathroom? I wondered, as I chugged the toilet brush
around the bowl. Gran had me vac-uum the cat hair off the sofa. I emptied all the trash cans. I polished
all the tables. I wiped down the washer and the dryer, for goodness's sake.
When Gran urged me to get in the shower and change my clothes, I realized that she regarded Bill the
vampire as my date. That made me feel a little odd. One, Gran was so des-perate for me to have a social
life that even a vampire was eligible for my attention; two, that I had some feelings that backed up that
idea; three, that Bill might accurately read all this; four, could vampires even do it like humans?
I showered and put on my makeup and wore a dress, since I knew Gran would have a fit if I didn't. It
was a little blue cotton-knit dress with tiny daisies all over it, and it was tighter than Gran liked and
shorter than Jason deemed proper in his sister. I'd heard that the first time I'd worn it. I put my little
yellow ball earrings in and wore my hair pulled up and back with a yellow banana clip holding it loosely.
Gran gave me one odd look, which I was at a loss tointerpret. I could have found out easily enough by
listening in, but that was a terrible thing to do to the person you lived with, so I was careful not to. She
herself was wearing a skirt and blouse that she often wore to the Descendants of the Glorious Dead
meetings, not quite good enough for church, but not plain enough for everyday wear.
I was sweeping the front porch, which we'd forgotten, when he came. He made a vampire entrance; one
minute he wasn't there, and the next he was, standing at the bottom of the steps and looking up at me.

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I grinned. "Didn't scare me," I said.
He looked a little embarrassed. "It's just a habit," he said, "appearing like that. I don't make much noise."
I opened the door. "Come on in," I invited, and he came up the steps, looking around.
"I remember this," he said. "It wasn't so big, though."
"You remember this house? Gran's gonna love it." I pre-ceded him into the living room, calling Gran as I
went.
She came into the living room very much on her dignity, and I realized for the first time she'd taken great
pains with her thick white hair, which was smooth and orderly for a change, wrapped around her head in
a complicated coil. She had on lipstick, too.
Bill proved as adept at social tactics as my grandmother. They greeted, thanked each other,
complimented, and finally Bill ended up sitting on the couch and, after carrying out a tray with three
glasses of peach tea, my Gran sat in the easy chair, making it clear I was to perch by Bill. There was no
way to get out of this without being even more obvious, so I sat by him, but scooted forward to the edge,
as if I might hop up at any moment to get him a refill on his, the ritual glass of iced tea.
He politely touched his lips to the edge of the glass and then set it down. Gran and I took big nervous
swallows of ours.
Gran picked an unfortunate opening topic. She said, "I guess you heard about the strange tornado."
'Tell me," Bill said, his cool voice as smooth as silk. I didn't dare look at him, but sat with my hands
folded and my eyes fixed to them.
So Gran told him about the freak tornado and the deaths of the Rats. She told him the whole thing
seemed pretty awful, but cut-and-dried, and at that I thought Bill relaxed just a millimeter.
"I went by yesterday on my way to work," I said, without raising my gaze. "By the trailer."
"Did you find it looked as you expected?" Bill asked, only curiosity in his voice.
"No," I said. "It wasn't anything I could have expected. I was really ... amazed."
"Sookie, you've seen tornado damage before," Gran said, surprised.
I changed the subject. "Bill, where'd you get your shirt? It looks nice." He was wearing khaki Dockers
and a green-and-brown striped golfing shirt, polished loafers, and thin, brown socks.
"Dillard's," he said, and I tried to imagine him at the mall in Monroe, perhaps, other people turning to
look at this ex-otic creature with his glowing skin and beautiful eyes. Where would he get the money to
pay with? How did he wash his clothes? Did he go into his coffin naked? Did he have a car or did he just
float wherever he wanted to go?
Gran was pleased with the normality of Bill's shopping habits. It gave me another pang of pain, observing
how glad she was to see my supposed suitor in her living room, even if (according to popular literature)
he was a victim of a virus that made him seem dead.

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Gran plunged into questioning Bill. He answered her with courtesy and apparent goodwill. Okay, he was
apolite dead man.
"And your people were from this area?" Gran inquired.
"My father's people were Comptons, my mother's people Loudermilks," Bill said readily. He seemed
quite relaxed.
"There are lots of Loudermilks left," Gran said happily. "But I'm afraid old Mr. Jessie Compton died last
year."
"I know," Bill said easily. "That's why I came back. The land reverted to me, and since things have
changed in our culture toward people of my particular persuasion, I decided to claim it."
"Did you know the Stackhouses? Sookie says you have along history." I thought Gran had put it well. I
smiled at my hands.
"I remember Jonas Stackhouse," Bill said, to Gran's delight. "My folks were here when Bon Temps was
just a hole in the road at the edge of the frontier. Jonas Stackhouse moved here with his wife and his four
children when I was a young man of sixteen. Isn't this the house he built, at least in part?"
I noticed that when Bill was thinking of the past, his voice took on a different cadence and vocabulary. I
wondered how many changes in slang and tone his English had taken on through the past century.
Of course, Gran was in genealogical hog heaven. She wanted to know all about Jonas, her husband's
great-great-great-great-grandfather. "Did he own slaves?" she asked.
"Ma'am, if I remember correctly, he had a house slave and a yard slave. The house slave was a woman
of middle age and the yard slave a very big young man, very strong, named Minas. But the Stackhouses
mostly worked their own fields, as did my folks."
"Oh, that is exactly the kind of thing my little group would love to hear! Did Sookie tell you..." Gran and
Bill, after much polite do-si-doing, set a date for Bill to address a night meeting of the Descendants.
"And now, if you'll excuse Sookie and me, maybe we'll take a walk. It's a lovely night." Slowly, so I
could see it coming, he reached over and took my hand, rising and pull-ing me to my feet, too. His hand
was cold and hard and smooth. Bill wasn't quite asking Gran's permission, but not quite not, either.
"Oh, you two go on," my grandmother said, fluttering with happiness. "I have so many things to look up.
You'll have to tell me all the local names you remember from when you were ..." and here Gran ran
down, not wanting to say some-thing wounding.
"Resident here in Bon Temps," I supplied helpfully.
"Of course," the vampire said, and I could tell from the compression of his lips that he was trying not to
smile.
Somehow we were at the door, and I knew that Bill hadlifted me and moved me quickly. I smiled,
genuinely. I like the unexpected.

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"We'll be back in a while," I said to Gran. I didn't think she'd noticed my odd transition, since she was
gathering up our tea glasses.
"Oh, you two don't hurry on my account," she said. "I'll be just fine."
Outside, the frogs and toads and bugs were singing their nightly rural opera. Bill kept my hand as we
strolled out into the yard, full of the smell of new-mown grass and budding things. My cat, Tina, came out
of the shadows and asked to be tickled, and I bent over and scratched her head. To my surprise, the cat
rubbed against Bill's legs, an activity he did nothing to discourage.
"You like this animal?" he asked, his voice neutral.
"It's my cat," I said. "Her name is Tina, and I like her a lot."
Without comment, Bill stood still, waiting until Tina went on her way into the darkness outside the porch
light.
"Would you like to sit in the swing or the lawn chairs, or would you like to walk?" I asked, since I felt I
was now the hostess.
"Oh, let's walk for a while. I need to stretch my legs."
Somehow this statement unsettled me a little, but I began moving down the long driveway in the direction
of the two-lane parish road that ran in front of both our homes.
"Did the trailer upset you?"
I tried to think how to put it.
"I feel very ... hmmm. Fragile. When I think about the trailer."
"You knew I was strong."
I tilted my head from side to side, considering. "Yes, but I didn't realize the full extent of your strength," I
told him. "Or your imagination."
"Over the years, we get good at hiding what we've done."
"So. I guess you've killed a bunch of people."
"Some." Deal with it, his voice implied.
I clasped both hands behind my back. "Were you hungrier right after you became a vampire? How did
that happen?"
He hadn't expected that. He looked at me. I could feel hiseyes on me even though we were now in the
dark. The woods were close around us. Our feet crunched on the gravel.
"As to how I became a vampire, that's too long a story for now," he said. "But yes, when I was
younger—a few times—I killed by accident. I was never sure when I'd get to eat again, you understand?
We were always hunted, nat-urally, and there was no such thing as artificial blood. And there were not as

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many people then. But I had been a good man when I was alive—I mean, before I caught the virus. So I
tried to be civilized about it, select bad people as my victims, never feed on children. I managed never to
kill a child, at least. It's so different now. I can go to the all-night clinic in any city and get some synthetic
blood, though it's disgusting. Or I can pay a whore and get enough blood to keep going for a couple of
days. Or I can glamor someone, so they'll let me bite them for love and then forget all about it. And I
don't need so much now."
"Or you can meet a girl who gets head injuries," I said.
"Oh, you were the dessert. The Rattrays were the meal."
Deal with it.
"Whoa," I said, feeling breathless. "Give me a minute."
And he did. Not one man in a million would have allowed me that time without speaking. I opened my
mind, let my guards down completely, relaxed. His silence washed over me. I stood, closed my eyes,
breathed out the relief that was too profound for words.
"Are you happy now?" he asked, just as if he could tell.
"Yes," I breathed. At that moment I felt that no matter what this creature beside me had done, this peace
was price-less after a lifetime of the yammering of other minds inside my own.
"You feel good to me, too," he said, surprising me.
"How so?" I asked, dreamy and slow.
"No fear, no hurry, no condemnation. I don't have to use my glamor to make you hold still, to have a
conversation with you."
"Glamor?"
"Like hypnotism," he explained. "All vampires use it, to some extent or another. Because to feed, until
the new syn-thetic blood was developed, we had to persuade people wewere harmless ... or assure them
they hadn't seen us at all ... or delude them into thinking they'd seen something else."
"Does it work on me?"
"Of course," he said, sounding shocked.
"Okay, do it."
"Look at me."
"It's dark."
"No matter. Look at my face." And he stepped in front of me, his hands resting lightly on my shoulders,
and looked down at me. I could see the faint shine of his skin and eyes, and I peered up at him,
wondering if I'd begin to squawk like a chicken or take my clothes off.

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But what happened was ... nothing. I felt only the nearly druglike relaxation of being with him.
"Can you feel my influence?" he asked. He sounded a little breathless.
"Not a bit, I'm sorry," I said humbly. "I just see you glow."
"You can see that?" I'd surprised him again.
"Sure. Can't everyone?"
"No. This is strange, Sookie."
"If you say so. Can I see you levitate?"
"Right here?" Bill sounded amused.
"Sure, why not? Unless there's a reason?"
"No, none at all." And he let go of my arms and began to rise.
I breathed a sigh of pure rapture. He floated up in the dark, gleaming like white marble in the moonlight.
When he was about two feet off the ground, he began hovering. I thought he was smiling down at me.
"Can all of you do that?" I asked.
"Can you sing?"
"Nope, can't carry a tune."
"Well, we can't all do the same things, either." Bill came down slowly and landed on the ground without
a thump. "Most humans are squeamish about vampires. You don't seem to be," he commented.
I shrugged. Who was I to be squeamish about something out of the ordinary? He seemed to understand
because, aftera pause, during which we'd resumed walking, Bill said, "Has it always been hard for you?"
"Yes, always." I couldn't say otherwise, though I didn't want to whine. "When I was very small, that was
worst, because I didn't know how to put up my guard, and I heard thoughts I wasn't supposed to hear,
of course, and I repeated them like a child will. My parents didn't know what to do about me. It
embarrassed my father, in particular. My mother finally took me to a child psychologist, who knew
exactly what I was, but she just couldn't accept it and kept trying to tell my folks I was reading their body
language and was very observant, so I had good reason to imagine I heard people's thoughts. Of course,
she couldn't admit I was literallyhear-ing people's thoughts because that just didn't fit into her world.
"And I did poorly in school because it was so hard for me to concentrate when so few others were. But
when there was testing, I would test very high because the other kids were concentrating on their own
papers ... that gave me a little leeway. Sometimes my folks thought I was lazy for not doing well on
everyday work. Sometimes the teachers thought I had a learning disability; oh, you wouldn't believe the
the-ories. I must have had my eyes and ears tested every two months, seemed like, and brain scans ...
gosh. My poor folks paid through the nose. But they never could accept the simple truth. At least
outwardly, you know?"